


This Is Not Part of Derelict (but it really should be)

by Psilent (HereThereBeFic), Wasthatapun



Category: Portal (Video Game), Steam Powered Giraffe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-27
Updated: 2013-03-27
Packaged: 2017-12-06 15:21:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/737165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HereThereBeFic/pseuds/Psilent, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wasthatapun/pseuds/Wasthatapun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve wakes up to find a rather curious addition to his physiology and it might not be apertures fault</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Is Not Part of Derelict (but it really should be)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Psilent (HereThereBeFic)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HereThereBeFic/gifts).



Steve woke up to his hair hissing and trying to eat him. Well, not so much eat him as nuzzling against his ear and cheek. 

Steve froze, not daring to move or even breathe with the writhing, shifting things that close to his face until he realized The Jon was sitting at his side and giggling as the tiny creatures nipped at his metal fingers.

“…Jon,” he said calmly, because the grey area between calm and panicked had completely vanished, and he was pretty sure panicking would be a bad idea in this situation. “What’s going on?”

The Jon just kept giggling and toying with the strange creatures. “Why didn’t you tell me you had pets Steve? They’re so cute!”

“I… You mean you didn’t do this?”

“Not that I’m aware of, no.”

“That’s reassuring.” He mulled over his options for a minute. “Think you could maybe get Michael and Sam for me?”

“Why can’t you?”

“…Honestly? I’m a little scared to move”

“Oh, Okay!” and the brass/gold bot skipped off to wake the other two humans.

“Michael!” he said cheerfully, shaking the young scientist’s shoulder. “Wake up! Steve’s hair is dragons!”

Michael rolled over, swatting him away. “Gngfgg. …Wait, what?” He sat up. “His… what?”

“My hair,” Steve called from across the floor, “is dragons.” One of the creatures drew back and puffed out a little burst of flame as if to further explain.

“You want to know what’s sad?” Sam said from where he was stretching and pulling himself to his feet. “Still not the weirdest thing i’ve seen around here”

“I saw a six-headed donkey playing an accordion on a unicycle once,” said The Jon.

“This is no time for stories, The Jon,” Michael muttered, running a hand over his face and trying to wake up the rest of the way.

“No, that one actually happened,” said The Spine.

Michael stared at him for a moment before shaking his head and crawling to his friend’s side. The dragons wriggled happily at his appearance.

“Well?” said Steve.

“…Those are definitely dragons.”

“…Thanks a lot.”

One of them nipped playfully at Michael’s hand. He wondered if he was still asleep.

Steve closed his eyes and drew in a long breath and sat up slowly, feeling as the shifting creatures flattened and calmed in reaction.

There was a *hic* next to his right ear and a little plume of smoke shot into his vision.

“Think you could maybe try and figure out why my dreads have suddenly turned into dragons genius?” he snarked. Michael nodded and stumbled over to the Body Bag Of Holding and began digging around.

Out came the scanner and Steve listened to the tell tale sound of its inner workings and the quiet beep he still hadn’t asked Michael if he could hear.

“Whatsit say Michael?” he asked as two tendrils got into a fight beside his left temple and he brushed them back.

“…” Michael looked up at him and back at the scanner, Steve could hear his heartbeat increasing.

“Come on Michael, tell me. What did Aperture do to make me grow dragon dreads of all things?”

“First, promise they won’t try and burn me.”

“Michael.”

He sighed and set the scanner down, tapping his fingers together nervously. 

“They…umm…they didn’t make this happen…” His heart was pounding nervously a mile a minute and Steve waited patiently for the but.

“They kinda… made them go away…you started out like this and they made them…I dunno…dormant?”

Steve blinked. He opened his mouth to speak, couldn’t think of anything to say, and shut it again.

He really, really hoped this didn’t explain his vague memories of fire and screaming. Really.

And if it did, he really, really, really hoped the screaming had come from Aperture scientists.

He took a deep breath and finally managed to ask, rather calmly he thought, “Why did it wear off now?”

“Because the universe hates us?” Sam drawled, staying a good distance away from him and his new ‘pets’.

Steve’s shoulders tensed and a few of the tiny creatures reared up and hissed angrily at Sam, hoods opening threateningly.

Michael’s eyes were wide and he was obviously uncomfortable with the whole ordeal.

“Can you… I don’t know, can you make them go back?” Steve asked nervously, trying to hunch away from his own hair - which began hissing and wailing unhappily.

Michael backed away. “I think you made them sad.”

“…Sorry?” Steve tried, reaching up to pet one of the creatures and feeling extremely awkward.

They pouted, obviously not pleased either.

Michael blinked slowly and shook his head, moving to sit beside his friend again.

“My best bet? Whatever was keeping these things…normal? away? hair? I dunno, not dragon-ee, was probably in your life support or maybe the sedative and just kinda… wore off maybe?” The brood of dragons seemed to have perked up with Michael’s presence and were once again twisting about and even cooing softly as they looked about and explored.

Steve tensed, trying to stay still as his head was pulled in one direction and then another. “I really hope they can’t fly. Because I’m pretty sure the rest of me can’t.”

The dragons writhed around, hissing at each other in a way that, somehow, didn’t hurt his ears. Finally they seemed to come to a concensus, and he yelped as they collectively surged forward, propelling him directly towards Michael. He fell a few feet short and nearly faceplanted into the ground.

When he looked up, Michael was hiding a very obvious grin behind his hand. “Dude, I think your hair’s in love with me.”

“This is so not okay.” Oh god, Steve thought, were they giggling?

He swatted at them irritably. “Hey! No! No assaulting my friends with love.”

They pouted more.

And now Michael was giggling. Which was just so very helpful.

“Michael,” Steve growled. “This isn’t funny.”

“It kinda is.”

“It really is,” Sam piped up

“Shut up, Sam,” Steve snapped. “They don’t even like you.”

“No, but they seem really fond of Michael.”

“Shut up,” Steve repeated, trying to hold his hair back with his hands.

They huffed and settled down, one straying from the rest to snuggle under his chin.

Steve crossed his eyes trying to look down at it. “Um. Hi?”

“At least one strand of your hair likes you more than me.”

“Quiet, Michael.”

“Yeah, quiet, Michael,” Sam echoed. “Steve and his hair are bonding.”

“You two are really great friends, you know that?”

Meanwhile, The Spine and The Jon had woken up Rabbit, who had woken up Jenny, and the four of them were now crowding around trying to get a good look. Steve felt like an exhibit at some sort of backwards science fair.

And they really seemed to like The Jon. They bounced happily as he completely ignored Steve’s personal space (as he was prone to doing with everyone) and began playing with them once again.

Steve sighed in resignation as the dragons pulled him sideways trying to swarm around The Jon.

“How did I have these things before and not… I don’t know, accidentally kill a bunch of people?”

“Maybe you did,” Sam said seriously. “You do have amnesia.”

“…Shut up.”

“Maybe they’re all hardened killers. And so are you.”

The dragons stopped their playing and turned to give Sam a sideways glance, as if to say ‘really? really now?’

“Okay!” Steve clapped his hands together. “All in favor of ignoring everything Sam says for the rest of this… ordeal?”

There was a concensus from his hair, as well as Michael, Rabbit, and The Spine. The Jon was too interested in playing keep away with a particular dragon to care.

“Ow - Jon, these… still kind of feel like hair. And you’re sort of making it pull itself.”

The dragon in question lowered its head, its body language plainly apologizing for its actions.

Steve reached up to stroke it almost automatically, realizing halfway through the action what he was doing. “…I really find it hard to believe I completely forgot about having dragons for hair. It… It never even occurred to me. That’s weird, right?”

“Not as weird as having dragons for hair,” said Sam, but everyone ignored him.

The shock was starting to wear off and Steve was starting to realize that a lot of the things that he would think should feel alien and off-putting felt completely natural. The tiny creatures tended to shift as he did, didn’t seem especially prone to getting into his eyesight unless for a specific purpose, and even the sound of them felt natural and just a little comforting. Sort of the exact opposite of the way the silence inherent in The Jon’s void felt so very un-natural.

Steve stood up. “Well,” he said, glancing around at the others. “We should probably get moving.”

He was met with several blank stares, and a confused “Bwuh?” from Jenny.

“But…” said Michael. “But your hair is dragons. You were just freaking out about it five seconds ago!”

Steve shrugged. “I got over it.” One of the dragons cooed in his ear, setting something buzzing pleasantly in the synthetics. He stroked a finger over the creature’s head. “They’re kinda… nice.”

“They’re cute!” The Jon agreed enthusiastically, jumping up and reaching a hand out for the dragons to nip at.

“Heh, and we match now.” Rabbit chuckled, allowing a bit of flame to lick from his own mouth, which earned a glare from The Spine.

“…I forgot he could do that,” said Steve, inching away slightly and hoping his hair didn’t get any ideas.

They did, a few shot little sparks of flame back, though to Steve’s relief they seemed to have extremely good aim and knew where they should and shouldn’t shoot. And when they settled back down the one that always seemed to settle under his chin or by his cheek looked up at him and just seemed so proud of itself he couldn’t help but smile.

“Well that’s… sweet,” Sam said dryly. “One big happy family of fiery death over there. Great.”

“You’re just jealous because your hair isn’t dragons,” said The Jon, sticking his tongue out. “Your hair is just… orange.”

“At least I have hair,” Sam pointed out.

The Jon crossed his arms. “I have some! Just… not… here.”

Sam was treated to the dreads at the back of Steve’s head giving him a look that rather plainly said ‘Stop being an ass Sam.’

“The back of your head is glaring at me,” Sam complained.

“That’s because the front of my head isn’t facing you,” Steve said nicely. A few of those same dreads stuck out their tongues at Sam, who crossed his arms and tried to move out of their line of sight.

Which clearly wasn’t going to work unless he hid behind one of the robots.

Steve snorted, a moment later realizing he was fully aware of what was going on without ever turning around. He glanced over his shoulders at the slowly swaying and shifting creatures and could have sworn he felt a sense of cocky pride.

He ran a hand though his hair, tucking the dreads behind his ear. They happily settled at the action. He smiled. “Okay, I’m starting to like these guys.”


End file.
